E Y E
by Damian1245
Summary: TW; Death, Very slight language / Oneshot drama about Prussia dying, possessing England's body, and a lot of distress and a happy ending. / Main pairing is France/Prussia, with subtle undertones of France/England (though not much at all). / Characters mentioned; Germany, Spain, Norway, Romania


The man awoke with a start, heart racing in his ears and vision blurred. Sitting bolt upright with his head whipping from one side to the other, trying to gain some idea of where in the hell he was, his eyes flickered downward at the lush blanket covering half his body. His hands were smallish, oddly delicate and not at all like he remembered, and he felt heavy, as if something sat square on his shoulders and just wouldn't leave. This garnered another look around the room, and after spying a mirror the man leaped out of the bed, staggering and stumbling until he made it to the wall, panting heavily as he stared into what was supposed to be a pale face and red eyes. He lifted a hand up to his face, laying fingers beneath the red eye while the other was a staggering green. Fingers traveled upward to grab golden hair, shoving it up away from the thick brows on his head. This couldn't be right, he wasn't looking in a mirror! This wasn't him!  
Movement caught his attention from the corner of his green eye, and he turned to look at what could only be described as a tiny glowing blur at first, and after squinting he could make out what appeared to be a woman with wings. What. She fluttered in the air in front of him before zipping backward into two more of them, and they all stared back at each other for what felt like a very long couple of moments. As he opened his mouth to speak, they vanished in a flash of light, and he was left alone once more. Why did he see Arthur in the mirror? Who.. or what, even, were those small winged persons? His head turned back to the mirror and he prodded at his face again, as if hoping that he would wake up from this strange and frankly quite terrifying dream.

"Gilbert! I'm home!" Silence followed the large blond's words, and something settled deep into his gut, something bad. He drew a hand back through slicked hair and set the bag of groceries on the counter, that feeling in his chest worsening as he stepped back into the hallway. Every step he took was faster than the last, and by the time he reached the basement door he was nearly running, throwing it open to where it smacked against the shelf behind it. Flying down the steps two at a time, he halted in the living space and whipped his head around. There was no sign of his older brother out there, so he bolted to the bedroom and grabbed the knob, heart thudding in his head when he found it locked. Gilbert never locked his door like this, he never had the need to!  
It took exactly two minutes and thirteen seconds to get the door unlocked, but it felt like it took hours, as the moment it flew open he was greeted by.. nothing. It was quiet and it was cold, and he could barely make out the stark white hair against the dark covers. Flicking on the light, he almost wanted to sigh in relief that Gil was actually there. The feeling didn't pass. He moved forward slowly, the lump in his throat making his mouth dry and making him unable to speak. He reached the bed and stretched his hand out, pulling back the cover to gaze at what he hoped was his sleeping brother's face. But he looked too pale, the skin under his eyes was dark, and as Ludwig leaned his knee on the bed something clicked in his head. His hand was clammy as he reached out, pressing two fingers against his precious brother's throat. Nothing. He waited a moment. Nothing. His vision began to blur and it was a long time before he realized his tears had soaked into the white sheet beneath him. What was that noise?  
Lud's head shot up and he saw the glow of Gil's phone, reaching for it on the nightstand and staring at the ridiculous nickname that was above the picture of a familiar Frenchman. His chest tightened further. Sliding the phone to unlock, he answered the call and lifted the phone to his ear, the worried voice making it all feel much worse.  
"..Francis. This is Ludwig.. Gil is.. G-Gil.. is.. g-gone.."

The phone fell away from the blond's grasp, blue eyes staring vacantly past the person in front of him. The words he had heard repeated over and over in his head, swimming around as his disbelief and denial threw him this way and that. He couldn't hear Antonio's frantic words, didn't see him lift the phone off the ground and didn't hear him ask the person on the other end what the hell just happened. The world spun and when his vision brought him back to reality, he was sitting on the ground with Toni holding tight to his shoulders. He was crying, and the warm wet feeling on his own face told him that he was crying as well. Time felt like it had stopped, and it felt like he had been ripped in two.  
"T-Tonio, I.. I can't.."  
"I k-know, Francis, amigo.. I know.."  
The embrace that followed only managed to make the tears come harder, and they sat in each other's arms for what felt like hours. Before he knew what had happened, they were at Ludwig's home and in Gilbert's bedroom, and he was on his knees at the bedside, his face buried into the cold pale hand he was grasping so tightly. He was praying, as if he had never prayed for anything, and the tears wouldn't stop. Others were there but he didn't know who, he didn't care who, he just wanted his Prussian back. He had been fine the day before, had been fine just a few hours before the gut feeling had started. He had tried to text the man, and had called him several times with no response. It had alarmed him, so he had been in the middle of booking a flight to Germany with Toni when he had heard Ludwig's voice on the phone.  
It was like a nightmare, a horrible horrible nightmare, and he just wanted it to end. Another few hours passed and he now sat in his living room with a bottle of rum sitting half empty on the floor beside his feet. The tears would no longer come, and he stared at the texts with a hollow chest, rereading each one again and again. They had been lovers, secret at one time even, and it had taken a long time for them to be able to tell anyone besides Toni. Hell, it had taken years and years for them to tell their best friend, and even then they had not really confessed to each other. They were soul mates. And as one would think, it felt like Francis' soul had been ripped in two, shredded and left in absolute pieces.  
The phone shifted to the face of a scowling Englishman with a brief text that simply said: Call me, it's urgent. He didn't want to speak to him, but something compelled him to tap the other's face, his thumb hovering above the green button before finally pressing it, lifting the phone to his ear and preparing himself for whatever the man might say.

Gil had paced the room again and again, occasionally seeing those creatures from the corner of his eye, always the green one, and though he had pieced together what was going on a long time ago, he had only just made reality from it. A buzz alerted him to a phone on the nightstand and he had scrambled to it, eyes widening as texts flooded in from several contacts. All of them with the same message.  
"Gil is dead."  
"Prussia has passed.."  
"I can't believe he's gone!"  
It set in quickly and he had visited the bathroom more than once as he purged poor Arthur's stomach of its contents until only acid came up. It was terrible. He carefully went through each text and found the one from his own brother, Ludwig, and it was heartbreaking. There was nothing from Francis. He chewed on his lip for a long time before responding to Lud, very carefully and cautiously telling him to put the body on ice before getting any funeral proceedings underway. There was a confused and almost angry reply, but he managed to reassure him that it was going to simply be for scientific use, that he wanted to see if there had been a physical problem or if he ad simply faded as a nation. It worked.  
As he stared at the phone, a certain contact listed just beneath his fingertips, his heart raced in his chest and he tried to think of how to do this. He could call and speak to him without a problem, though there was the chance that he wouldn't answer. Instead, Gil opted to send him a message. Call me, it's urgent. It would get his attention if his phone wasn't off, and he hoped to God that he would follow through with the request because of how it was worded and short. It felt like hours passed before the phone buzzed in his hand, and he jumped initially before quickly answering it.

"You wanted to speak to me, Arthur?"  
He sounded so broken, it hurt to hear his voice.  
"Francis, are.. you drunk? It's not even noon.."  
There was a pause, a strange feeling bubbling in the silence.  
"If you're just going to mock and insult me, I would rather just-"  
"No! No, I.. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.. I didn't-"  
"I do not want pity either, Ar-"  
A hiccup came from the Frenchman and another pause of silence passed between them. It stretched on until an annoyed breath escaped Gil.  
"You're a serious liar, Francis. You said you wouldn't cry when I died. You said you would be sad but that you wouldn't cry, and you said you wouldn't get drunk but that you would bake a cake to celebrate me."  
Another pause.  
"What- What are you- How did you know-"  
"I don't know how it happened or why, but I'm not Arthur. I mean.. I am, but.. I'm me. Gilbert. I don't even sound like me.. but you know it, don't you?!"  
"Stop fucking with me, Arthur, you're so sick-!"  
"Francis!"  
Gil yanked the phone away from his ear and swiped through until he found the camera, snapping a picture of his face and sending it forward.  
"Look at my face. Look at my eyes, and tell me that I'm fucking with you again."  
Silence followed after a buzz and soft taps indicated that he was looking at the image, before a quiet voice returned, sounding like tears had started.  
"G-Gilbert.. is.. is it really.."  
"I told you, idiot.. it's really me. I wish I knew how or why.."  
There was silence and crying and a lot of happy yet confused words exchanged before something was arranged, and before long they were standing in front of each other in Arthur's doorway, Francis staring at him still in pajamas and Gil looking awkward and uncomfortable in the blond's body. Part of him wondered if Arthur was conscious through all of this, and he was sure that he would help him if he was.

Some time had passed since the initial message, and even more time since the body had been transported from Germany to England, specifically to Arthur's home. Equipment had been supplied by Francis, and everything was set up to keep the body from decaying. Days passed before finally Gil found something in the many tomes Arthur kept, and he was almost sure that a faerie had helped him even though they still kept out of sight. A spell book, filling with many different things from conjuring food to creating earth golems, and finding one in particular made him hopeful that something could be done. Francis was still unsure, but after another day or so they were joined by the two other most magic-tuned nations.  
It had been clear that Gil had only been given a short time, weakening as the moments ticked by on the day they set to return him to his body. When at last it came, it didn't work the first time. Nor the second or third, but he didn't want to give up despite Francis feeling more and more skeptical and terrified. Several more times and Arthur's body was paling from the effort, and even the other two were starting to worry. A last ditch effort was made, Gil requesting to be laid by his body, and as he closed his eyes and grasped the cold hand tight, the incantation was spoken and the air seemed to become heavy. Lights flickered into existence and suddenly Arthur sat up coughing, stumbling away from the body.  
Time ticked by, Francis watching the pale body as it seemed to be stretched thin the longer the body did nothing. Tears welled up in his eyes again and he bowed his head forward, breaths coming out as broken sobs even with the coughing filling the room. Another tick, another tock, until finally the sound of a grandfather clock's chime filled the air. Silence.  
"Ficken, es ist kalt!"  
Gil sat up away from the ice packs, shivering and taking in sharp breaths that stung every bit of his insides. Arthur stared up toward him and Francis, an irritated yet relieved expression on his face. Francis was dumbfounded, unbelieving before finally he reached out to grab the Prussian, yanking him away from the bed and tumbling backward into the floor with the sudden weight added to his own. Laughter and sobbing ensued, along with several hours of sitting in front of a fire with several blankets wrapped around the lovers. Words were exchanged between the three, the other two nations having left with lighter hearts after the success, and they agreed not to mention anything about Gil's possession.  
They waited a long time before sending out messages, and Arthur's phone blew up with texts both disbelieving and frantic for it to be true. The next few weeks were a blur, at it was made a requirement for Gil to always be accompanied and his trips to the doctor nations were made a monthly thing for a while as well. Francis was more than happy to have Gil move in at his home, and they felt whole again as they laid in each other's arms every night. Something had changed with that ordeal, and everyone felt it, and perhaps Arthur seemed to be a little kinder to the two, though he was still irritated every time they did something silly with their little trio.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** This is kind of loosely based on a video ( watch?v=DALFBIHwCuM ) but mostly just on the imagery of Arthur with the bi-colored eyes. The name of the song is Eye, the cover is by Fukuwa.  
I'm not really sure what drove me to writing this, but I feel like I'm pretty happy with it after not writing for so long. I needed to get it out of my system, and I needed to do something other than drawing. My creative muse is slowly returning, and I think I'm feeling much better now than I have in a long time.


End file.
